The Hindu : Kodak signals digital dawn

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Sep 30, 2003

National

National

Kodak signals digital dawn

By Anand Parthasarathy

Bangalore Sept. 29. A century after George Eastman introduced the Box Brownie — the camera that made photography an affordable hobby for the average person — the business he founded `Kodak' has finally decided that it is time to go digital and say goodbye to the era of film-based picture taking.

The Rochester (New York state, U.S.) company, an icon of the photography business, told its investors yesterday that it would henceforth carve out its own space in the digital imaging business — that means digital cameras as well as photo finishing products like inkjet printers. It would taper off its traditional film-based business — which now accounts for 70 per cent of its revenues — and within the next three years this would form less than 40 per cent of its portfolio. It would not invest any more in film-based research. Rather, it would plough $ 3 billions into digital ventures.

Kodak is possibly the last major player in the traditional market to `see the digital light' so to speak: Other camera makers like Fuji, Minolta, Nikon and Canon have already switched over massively to a digital range, tapping both ends of the market: the relatively cheap `point-and-shoot' amateur cameras and the digital equivalents of full-fledged single lens reflex professional models.

The attraction of being able to shoot pictures without loading film — then viewing and printing them almost instantly, using a PC and a cheap printer — is proving so attractive that a discernible consumer `kiss off' for traditional cameras is apparent.

Interestingly, Kodak which has just slashed its dividend by almost 70 per cent to help finance its digital push, has India squarely in its radar, as a potential growth area — together with China, Brazil, Mexico and Russia. It will probably push a range of budget to semi-professional digital cameras as well as jumping into the inkjet printer arena dominated by companies such as HP, Epson and Lexmark. Indeed, it has no other choice. To depend on to the shrinking film business, may invite the fate that overtook Polaroid two years ago, when it was driven to bankruptcy, after its `instant photography' business dwindled.

Kodak has many firsts to its credit including the use of a celluloid-backed roll to replace the photographic plate in 1888; and the Kodachrome slide film in 1936. Digital cameras, where a sheet of liquid crystal (LCD) replaces the film and captures the image in a dense matrix of digital pixels have been around for a decade; but they are still a luxury, costing 3-5 times more than equivalent "analogue" cameras. In India, the `megapixel' digital amateur camera costs around Rs. 10,000, while professional SLR models are in the Rs. 40,000 - Rs. 60,000 range.

But Kodak's final farewell to film may turn out to be a key inflection point that will finally drive down prices and push us into the new era of digital photography.

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